The invention relates to an electronic stamp and a method of the kind apparent from the preamble of claims 1, 13, 22 and 27, respectively.
The invention thus relates to a stamp of the kind that is used during office work for marking of documents with a text line that occurs often, and a related method.
Regular office stamps are usually provided with a stamp pad of a rubber like material. In the stamp pad, the text and/or the graphics appear like a raised layer. Photo chemical or thermoelectric methods are used to obtain stamp pads. Lately, computer controlled laser machines are used to burn off the material around the desired pattern. The stamp pad, after it has been produced, is mounted on a construction with a shaft. The shaft together with the stamp pad make up the actual stamp. In addition to this there is a type of pad filled with ink. The stamp is pressed against this pad so that a thin layer of ink stays in the stamp pad. Only the ink that is present on the raised layer of the stamp pad is transferred, when the stamp is pressed against a flat surface. In this way the desired pattern emerges.
In some embodiments of the stamps, the ink-filled pad is built into the shaft.
Stamp pads usually exist as standard or specially made pads, with a company logotype and/or address information.
If the company changes its address information, it is not possible to change the stamp pad, but a new one has to be manufactured, which leads to extra cost and also takes some time.
The fact that the text in the stamp pad always is the same, means that a clerk has to have a whole set of stamps for all kinds of applications, which takes up space, and the cost increases with every extra stamp.
In addition, various stamps are often provided with an extra stamp pad in the shape of a rubber band, that rotates in order to get out different figures or texts. The purpose of this is to complete a text line with a current date and/or time.
This adds an extra task to the clerks, namely to manually adjust the date and/or time.
There are indeed electronic stamp machines doing this automatically, but they comprise complicated electromechanical components, which increase the manufacturing costs considerably and make them far to clumsy, so that one has to insert the document in the stationary stamp.
It is an object of the present invention to overcome the above described disadvantages of the presently known stamps.
Thus, an object of the invention is to provide a standard electronic stamp, where the text can easily be changed and/or make it possible to browse between different stamp suggestions, which results in the avoidance of several different stamps.
Another object with a preferred embodiment of the invention is to provide a stamp, with a built-in clock that automatically adjusts the date and/or time and also has a simple construction accomplishing this at considerably lower costs and sizes than what is possible today.
These objects are achieved with an electronic stamp and method according to the attached claims 1 and 7 respectively.
Embodiments of the inventive electronic stamp are stated in the attached dependent claims.
The invention will now be explained further below, by way of examples, with reference to the accompanying drawings.